Saturday, September 17, 2011

Dorms

I haven't written in this in a year and a half. Lately I've been wanting to again, but haven't been sure what to write. Well here goes:

I'm in the middle of reading Jonathan Franzen's The Discomfort Zone, a collection of essays about his life. In one he said his brother went to the University of Kansas and lived in Ellsworth Hall, which is exactly where I lived. I remember the single greatest thing about our room that impressed the very few visitors we had was our bathroom. Other rooms had bathrooms too, but for some reason my roommate Vince and I got a room with a handicapped-accessible bathroom, despite neither of us being handicapped in anyway. So, our bathroom was huge. I sometimes studied in there, using the sink as a desk, and also wrote songs in there, strumming an acoustic guitar and writing down chord progressions.

Lately I've written a few articles about dorms for a website I write stuff for. When I lived in the dorms, I hated it. Outside of my roommate, I just didn't really fit in with the other people there, the people who would run up and down the halls at 4:00 a.m., yelling and slamming into doors. But now, as I look back on that year living in Ellsworth, I do look back with some fondness almost, or at least I'm able to enjoy the fun things from that time. I also wish I would've done it better, that I had left our room more and made friends with the other people on the floor, instead of just staying in our room so much of the time.

But maybe that all shows how I've changed since then, how I used to be a guy sometimes hiding behind doors, and now I want to be outside, be in "it" and be a part of what's going on.


What I've Been Listening To Lately:
*Au Revoir Simone
*Fourth of July
*The National
*Lana Del Ray
*Twin Sister
*WTF w/ Marc Maron Podcast

Watching Lately:
*Childrens' Hospital
*I Confess
*Beginners
*The Future

Reading Lately:
*A Visit From The Goon Squad
*Breakfast At Tiffany's
*The Motel Life
*Juno: The Shooting Script

Some Pictures: